


Crustai Creeps

by draculard



Series: Comfortween [23]
Category: Star Wars Legends: Outbound Flight - Timothy Zahn
Genre: Gen, Humor and Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Platonic Cuddling, Scary Movies, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:48:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27307990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/draculard/pseuds/draculard
Summary: In-between all the high-stakes politics and military missions, it's hard to find anything fun to do at Crustai.Luckily Thrass has come prepared.
Relationships: Thrass | Mitth'ras'safis & Thrawn | Mitth'raw'nuruodo
Series: Comfortween [23]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1946224
Comments: 5
Kudos: 31
Collections: Comfortween 2020





	Crustai Creeps

In general, the upper deck of the Crustai base was quiet at night. This was where the higher-ranked officers kept their quarters, and all of them were well past the days when they felt like getting hammered in the barracks and having a party. Typically, by the time 9 p.m. standard-time rolled around, the upper deck was absolutely silent.

When Force Commander Thrawn had family visiting, however…

“ _Hush_ ,” said Thrass, trying and failing to put a note of reprimand in his voice. He stood and crossed to the other side of the room, staggering a little as he laughed, and slammed his palm against the sound-proofing controls on Thrawn’s door. 

“You’re the one who…” Thrawn lay flat on his back on the bed, his face covered with a pillow to muffle his laughter. Breathless, he tried again. “You’re the one who…”

Thrass wheezed out another quick laugh and then forced a stern expression on his face, dropping back into the impression of their least-favorite schoolteacher which had sent them both into hysterics. He hunched his shoulders and stuck out his hips the same way Master Yensk had always done, turning his spine into a question mark and letting his lower lip jut out. When Thrawn finally peeked out from beneath the pillow, he caught sight of Thrass and immediately buried his face in the fabric again.

“ _Stop_ ,” he gasped. After a moment, during which Thrass could see Thrawn’s abs shaking with suppressed laughter, Thrawn removed the pillow from his face and chucked it at Thrass. “If you keep tormenting me like this, you aren’t allowed to stay the night.”

Thrass scoffed as he caught the pillow. “As if I’d want to,” he said, scanning Thrawn’s quarters. “But are you sure you don’t have the patience for one more? I do a mean impression of General Ba’kif.”

“I know you do. It’s almost _frightening_ ,” Thrawn said, which was of course the highest praise any impersonator could receive.

“Thank you,” said Thrass with a brisk bow. He crossed the room and jumped onto the bed while Thrawn was busy wiping his eyes. Rolling onto his stomach, Thrass glanced up at Thrawn and said, “Speaking of frightening…”

Thrawn raised the hem of his shirt to his eyes, dabbing away the moisture there before he turned and raised a questioning eyebrow. 

“Remember that holo we used to love as kids?” Thrass asked, raising an eyebrow right back. He kept his voice studiously casual. 

Blank-faced, Thrawn said, “The four-part documentary on the war with—”

“The holo _we_ loved,” Thrass stressed. “Not the holo that you played to soothe yourself to sleep as a toddler because you were a little psychopath.”

Thrawn turned at the waist, giving Thrass a dark look. “If either of us was a psychopath, Thrass—”

Thrass waved this off with a little grin. “I’ll give you a hint,” he said, spreading his hands.

Thrawn stared at him, waiting patiently for the hint. While he was watching, Thrass slowly and deliberately bent his middle finger down toward his palm, as if it had been cut off. For a moment, Thrawn still didn’t seem to comprehend — then his face jolted into a look of disdain and mock-offense.

“You have a serious flaw in your memory if you honestly think _we_ loved that holo,” he said.

“Oh, come on,” said Thrass, letting his hands fall onto his chest. “You _begged_ to watch it with me.”

“No, I begged you to let _go_ of me so I could leave the room and stop being tortured by mediocre cinema,” Thrawn corrected.

Well, as Thrass remembered it, what had actually happened was that three-year-old Thrawn had sat on twelve-year-old Thrass’s lap and quietly but thoroughly wet his pants in horror when the main character’s head collapsed in a gory special effects miracle. Only afterward had the begging begun, and really it had been more like sobbing, and specifically it had been incoherent wails of absolute terror, but... 

“You say _Pohskapforian_ , I say _Pohskapforian_ ,” said Thrass with a lazy shrug. “Anyway…”

He gracefully flipped open the breast pocket on his tunic and extracted a holocard, holding it up so Thrawn could see. Thrawn’s eyes narrowed as he leaned in to read the print.

“Oh, please,” he scoffed, leaning away again. “You can’t possibly want to watch that _now_.”

“Oh?” said Thrass, raising an eyebrow. “And why not?”

“You loved it when you were _twelve_ , Thrass,” said Thrawn, as if that explained everything. “The quality must be simply dreadful.” When Thrass gave him a disbelieving look, unable to believe that his taste in cinema had been so impugned, Thrawn shook his head and turned away. “Put it in if you want to, but I assure you, you won’t last five minutes before you’re compelled to turn it off.”

Thrass jumped back to his feet in triumph and started rooting around for Thrawn’s projector. “I’ll have you know this film is revered as a cult classic from its era,” he informed Thrawn as he slipped the card into place and pressed play. 

“It’s rubbish,” Thrawn said.

“ _It’s rubbish_ ,” Thrass repeated in a mocking voice. “Says the man who had nightmares about it until he was thirteen.”

“You made me watch it _multiple_ _times_ ,” Thrawn protested, a note of indignation coloring his words. He was in the middle of rolling his eyes when he sat up straight on the edge of his bed, all hints of humor disappearing as Thrass approached the lightswitch. “What are you doing?” he asked.

“Turning off the lights,” said Thrass, his hand already on the dimmer. He looked at Thrawn in genuine surprise. “Why?”

For a long moment, Thrawn said nothing. His face was unreadable. His eyes flickered toward the holoprojector. Raising an eyebrow, Thrass slid the dimmer lower and lower, relishing the sardonic glare that Thrawn shot him.

“Scared of the dark?” he asked.

“It’s only that I’d like to get some work done while the film is playing,” said Thrawn calmly and almost convincingly. “Otherwise, this will be a total waste of time.”

“Ah,” said Thrass with an understanding nod. He grabbed Thrawn’s questis and tossed it into his lap as he approached the bed. “Good thing these things come with backlit screens, hm?”

Thrawn rolled his eyes and set the questis aside. He slid backward on the bed until his back was against the headboard, and Thrass joined him, their shoulders and legs touching.

“They really don’t give you much space for sleepovers, do they?” Thrass observed.

“Thankfully,” Thrawn agreed. “You will of course be returning to your _own_ quarters after this, yes?”

Thrass started to answer in the affirmative — no way in hell was he spending the night in Thrawn’s narrow military bed — but cut himself off immediately when he saw what was happening in the holo. “Shh, shh!” he said urgently, clamping a hand down on Thrawn’s arm. “This is the part where—”

“ _Oh_ ,” said Thrawn, jerking his arm out of Thrass’s grasp in a too-late attempt to cover his eyes. On the projector, a character caught in a radioactive chamber began to bubble and melt. Thrass watched the cheesy special effects and over-the-top screaming in utter glee, then glanced at Thrawn, who was watching with obvious discomfort and distaste.

“Oh, come on,” Thrass complained. “That’s just the opening scene! Did you seriously try to cover your eyes?”

“No,” said Thrawn, his jaw tightening.

He didn’t offer up any feasible reason why he might have jerked his arm out of Thrass’s grasp otherwise, and after a moment, Thrass let it go, turning back to the holo with a small smile. 

“It’s okay,” he said lightly. “I won’t tell your subordinates that you’re a coward.”

Thrawn gave Thrass a straight-armed shove right over the side of the bed. After hitting his elbow on the bedside table and banging his hip against the floor, Thrass struggled to his feet just in time to catch a glimpse of the atmospheric, artificial-fog-covered set.

“Ooh,” he said, bouncing back into position on the bed and jostling Thrawn in the process. “Remember this? The fog that eats people?”

“Thrass, I remember _everything_ about this movie,” Thrawn snapped. “You made me watch it every time Ticsi and Ticsen’i left us alone in the house.”

Thrass settled back against the headboard and cast a sidelong look at Thrawn, all innocence. “Well, then, if you’ve seen it so many times, it shouldn’t scare you at all,” he said with a smile. “Isn’t that how exposure therapy works? I’m doing you a favor.”

“Ah, yes,” said Thrawn drily, turning his eyes back to the holo. “Helping me overcome my intense phobias of melting skin, flesh-eating fog, and—”

Onscreen, a mutated Chiss burst out of the ground and crawled toward the camera, its spine twisting and poking out through its skin. Thrawn jumped, his hand coming down on Thrass’s forearm in a squeeze so intense that it was sure to bruise.

“ _Ow_ , Thrawn,” Thrass complained, trying and failing to shake his brother off.

“—and mutants,” Thrawn finished, without missing a beat. He took his hand off Thrass’s arm as if he’d never jumped, his voice even, his face the picture of composure. “This really is a disgusting movie, Thrass.”

Thrass eyed him, studying the faint lines of tension around Thrawn’s eyes. “Haven’t you — please don’t take offense at this, brother — haven’t you seen _actual_ , _real dead bodies_ before?”

Thrawn glanced at him absently, looked away, processed the question, and looked back again with his eyebrows furrowed. “Yes, but none have ever _crawled after me,_ ” he said indignantly, pointing at the projector. “What are you trying to say?”

Thrass raised his hands in the gesture for peace. “I’m not trying to say anything,” he assured Thrawn. “I just think it’s interesting. You’re always calm in battle, aren’t you? Certainly you were always calm in those schoolyard fights you were always getting into.”

“Breaking up,” Thrawn corrected him, turning back to face the movie.

“ _Getting into,_ ” Thrass said, refusing to be corrected. He studied Thrawn for a moment longer, then glanced back at the holo and said innocently, “Ar’alani told me you’re always calm in battle and only ever nervous when it comes to politics. Then, of course, she doesn’t know about the head-collapsing scene—”

Thrawn kicked him in the shin, putting quite a bit of muscle into it. With a yelp of pain, Thrass drew his leg up to his chest and started massaging what he was sure would be an absolutely massive bruise come morning. One of several massive bruises, at this rate.

Calmly, as if he hadn’t just tried to break his own brother’s tibia, Thrawn said, “Like me, Ar’alani finds horror films distasteful. I am sure she would understand.”

Oh, Thrawn thought Ar’alani didn’t like horror? Thrass sneaked another sidelong glance at his brother.

“I suspect what Ar’alani meant was that she found _torture porn_ distasteful,” Thrass said delicately. “That or she was just trying to make you feel better. Normal people do things like that, in case you didn’t know. I happen to know Ar’alani personally loves _this_ film, though. We watched it on the way here.”

Thrawn’s reaction to this wasn’t quite what Thrass expected. He raised a hand to his mouth and worried at his bottom lip, his eyes fixed on the film. 

“Thrawn?” Thrass prodded, touching Thrawn’s shoulder.

Thrawn slapped his hand away with a roll of the eyes. 

“Are you _studying_ the film?” asked Thrass suspiciously, recognizing the absent cast to Thrawn’s face. “That’s cheating!”

“Cheating?” Thrawn repeated, only glancing briefly at Thrass. “What am I cheating at?”

“You’re distracting yourself from how spooky it is by analyzing the painted backgrounds and special effects! That’s _cheating_!”

Thrawn scoffed. The scoff turned into a stifled gasp as another jump scare occurred onscreen. Thrawn pressed a hand over his mouth for a moment, his eyes wide, and then smoothly put his command face back into place and went back to studying the film as a work of dubious art.

“You’re hilarious,” said Thrass, watching him fondly. 

“You’re doing this for revenge, aren’t you,” said Thrawn flatly, bending his knees up to his chest with his hand still covering his mouth. He shifted subtly on the bed and leaned somewhat into Thrass, and Thrass leaned wholeheartedly back; for all his teasing, he pretended not to notice the fact that Thrawn was blatantly seeking comfort from him. 

“Revenge for what?” said Thrass brightly, focusing on Thrawn’s words instead of his probably-involuntary actions. He slung his arm around Thrawn’s shoulders. “For going gray before I hit thirty? Or do you mean for running myself ragged trying to take care of a man bent on destroying his own career? Or is it for constantly ingratiating myself to the Eighth Family in a possibly futile effort to save your ass? Or could it be—”

Onscreen, with a nasty squelching noise and a great deal of artificial blood and brains, the main character’s head collapsed. It really was undoubtedly the scariest part of the film; taken off-guard by his own monologue, even Thrass jumped when it happened. Next to him, Thrawn gave another strangled gasp, biting the sound off almost before Thrass could hear it; his eyes squeezed shut as he buried his face in Thrass’s shoulder, burrowing against him the same way he often had when they were children, with one hand covering his mouth and the other clutching at Thrass’s shirt. 

“Hm,” said Thrass, trying not to sound too smug as he stroked Thrawn’s hair. 

“Shut up,” Thrawn said, his voice muffled against Thrass’s shoulder. 

He didn’t pull away, though, Thrass noticed. In fact, he only shifted closer, covering his ears without any hint of self-consciousness as the movie’s next monster emerged on the scene with a gargling scream.

With a self-satisfied smirk, Thrass turned his attention back to the holo and settled in.

* * *

It was only the next morning, when he woke with a stiff neck and an aching back thanks to Thrawn’s god-awful military bed, that Thrass realized he’d ended up staying the night after all. He glanced down at his brother, still sleeping soundly with his arm slung around Thrass’s waist and his face hidden in Thrass’s shoulder. Thrawn had always vied for a shared bed when they were children, Thrass remembered — he’d tried everything, from claiming that it was too cold to sleep on his own to simply sneaking into Thrass’s bedroom when he thought his older brother was asleep.

None of it had ever worked, of course, Thrass thought fondly. Well, except for when they watched the movie, when of course Thrawn was so frightened and prone to nightmares that Thrass would have to be positively evil to—

To—

Scowling, Thrass slapped Thrawn awake.

“Ah,” said Thrawn thickly, squeezing his eyes shut in a flinch.

“You manipulative little _shit_ ,” Thrass said.


End file.
